Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Adsorption Of Polyisobutylene-Based Dispersants Onto Carbon Black, Travis Paul Holbrook

Dissertations

The formation of carbonaceous by-products (e.g. soot) during the operation of an internal combustion engine is unavoidable and the aggregation of this soot leads to deleterious effects including abrasive wear of the engine, increased oil viscosities, and sludge deposition. Dispersants, which are composed of a hydrophobic tail and a polar headgroup, are used as oil additives to aid in the suspension and stabilization of the soot particles. Polyisobutylene succinimide (PIBSI) is the most well-studied class of dispersants and is characterized by a linear architecture and polyamine headgroup that interacts with soot by acid-base and dipole-dipole interactions. As such, there remains …

The Antimicrobial Activity And Cellular Targets Of Plant Derived Aldehydes And Degradable Pro-Antimicrobial Networks In Pseudomonas Aeruginosa, Yetunde Adewunmi

Dissertations

Essential oils (EOs) are plant-derived products that have been long exploited for their antimicrobial activities in medicine, agriculture, and food preservation. EOs represent a promising alternative to conventional antibiotics due to the broad-range antimicrobial activity, low toxicity to human commensal bacteria, and the capacity to kill microorganisms without promoting resistance. Despite the progress in the understanding of the biological activity of EOs, many aspects of their mode of action remain inconclusive. The overarching aim of this work was to address these gaps by studying molecular interactions between antimicrobial plant aldehydes and the opportunistic human pathogen Pseudomonas aeruginosa. We initiated …

Towards Completely Automated Glycan Synthesis, Matteo Panza

Dissertations

Carbohydrates are ubiquitous both in nature as biologically active compounds and in medicine as pharmaceuticals. Although there has been continued interest in the synthesis of carbohydrates, chemical methods require specialized knowledge and hence remain cumbersome. The need for development of rapid, efficient and operationally simple procedures has come to the fore. This dissertation focuses on the development of a fully automated platform that will enable both experts and non-specialists to perform the synthesis of glycans. Existing automated methods for the synthesis of oligosaccharides are highly sophisticated, operationally complex, and require significant user know-how. By contrast, high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) …

Modifying Inhibited Primer Performance Via Control Of Epoxy-Amine Matrix Structure And Composition, Steven Wand

Dissertations

This research represents an effort to deliver a new fundamental understanding of how polymer matrix characteristics influence corrosion protection of organic coatings, in particular the performance of corrosion inhibitor-containing primers. By modifying the structure and composition features of epoxy-amine matrices which commonly serves as the binder for protective coatings, the thermal/mechanical, adhesion, and transport properties which govern coating performance and inhibitor release were altered in such a way that directly influenced protection efficacy. This research is composed of three distinct approaches towards systematically varying thermoset network characteristics and observing the resulting impact on transport behaviors and corrosion prevention, with an …

“Polysoaps” Via Raft Copolymerization To Form Well-Defined Micelles For Water Remediation And Targeted Drug Delivery Applications, Phillip Pickett

Dissertations

Amphiphilic copolymers have become increasingly important for environmental and biological applications due to their behavioral characteristics in aqueous solution. For example, structurally-tailored statistical amphiphilic copolymers or “polysoaps” can self-assemble into micelles or other architectures in water at various concentrations. Polysoaps may be differentiated from small molecule surfactant micelles in their capability to self-assemble into unimolecular associates (unimolecular micelles) with no dependence on concentration. Such micelles offer enormous potential for dispersion of hydrophobic species in water at high dilution. Importantly, each polymer chain forms its own micelle and upon dilution, these micelles remain intact and capable of dispersing hydrocarbon material in …

Engineering Multifunctional And Morphologically Diverse Polymer Brush Surfaces, Cassandra M. Reese

Dissertations

The combination of surface-initiated polymerization (SIP) and post-polymerization (PPM) serves as a powerful approach to fabricate complex, multifunctional polymer films, which can be precisely tuned for desired surface engineering applications. Careful manipulation of PPM parameters such as reaction conditions, the tethered brush parameters, and the physical properties of the unbound post-modifier greatly influence the depth of penetration of the post-modifier and the polymer brush compositional heterogeneity. This dissertation focuses on engineering polymer brush surfaces with multifunctional chemistries and tunable morphologies by investigating the PPM parameters that dictate the distribution of post-modifiers on grafted polymer brush surfaces.

The first chapter of …

Evaluating Corrosion Altering Properties Of Thiophene Based Copolymers, Robert Peterson

Dissertations

There is an important and ongoing debate on how or whether conductive polymers (CP) alter corrosion performance with some researchers reporting that CPs ultimately accelerate corrosion and others saying CPs, if understood could possibly replace the world’s best standard for corrosion prevention, i.e., chromium based inhibitors. The primary project goal was to improve our understanding of how CPs alter corrosion chemistry by 1) controlling the polymer structure and 2) in-turn the properties and then 3) targeting the best protocol for fast corrosion kinetic evaluation.

We detail the copolymer synthesis results and shift in corrosion protection properties for …